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TO CUBA AND BACK
BY
RICHARD HENRY DANA, JR.
1887
CONTENTS
I.--From Manhattan to El Morro
II.--Havana: _First Glimpses (1)_
III.--Havana: _First Glimpses (2)_
IV.--Havana: _Prisoners and Priests_
V.--Havana: _Olla Podrida_
VI.--Havana: _A Social Sunday_
VII.--Havana: _Belén and the Jesuits_
VIII.--Matanzas
IX.--To Limonar by Train
X.--A Sugar Plantation: _The Labor_
XI.--A Sugar Plantation: _The Life_
XII.--From Plantation to Plantation
XIII.--Matanzas and Environs
XIV.--Reflections via Railroad
XV.--Havana: _Social, Religious and Judicial Tidbits_
XVI.--Havana: _Worship, Etiquette and Humanitarianism_
XVII.--Havana: _Hospital and Prison_
XVIII.--Havana: _Bullfight_
XIX.--Havana: _More Manners and Customs_
XX.--Havana: _Slaves, Lotteries, Cockfights and Filibusters_
XXI.--A Summing-up: _Society, Politics, Religion, Slavery, Resources and
Reflections_
XXII.--Leave-taking
I.
FROM MANHATTAN TO EL MORRO
The steamer is to sail at one P.M.; and, by half-past twelve, her decks
are full, and the mud and snow of the pier are well trodden by men and
horses. Coaches drive down furiously, and nervous passengers put their
heads out to see if the steamer is off before her time; and on the
decks, and in the gangways, inexperienced passengers run against
everybody, and mistake the engineer for the steward, and come up the
same stairs they go down, without knowing it. In the dreary snow, the
newspaper vendors cry the papers, and the book vendors thrust yellow
covers into your face--"Reading for the voyage, sir--five hundred pages,
close print!" And that being rejected, they reverse the process of the
Sibyl--with "Here's another, sir, one thousand pages, double columns."
The great beam of the engine moves slowly up and down, and the black
hull sways at its fasts. A motley group are the passengers. Shivering
Cubans, exotics that have taken slight root in the hothouses of the
Fifth Avenue, are to brave a few days of sleet and cold at sea, for the
palm trees and mangoes, the cocoas and orange trees, they will be
sitting under in six days, at farthest. There are Yankee shipmasters
going out to join their "cotton wagons" at New Orleans and Mobile,
merchants pursuing a commerce that knows no rest and no locality;
confirmed invalids advised to go to Cuba to die under mosquito nets and
be buried in a Potter's Field; and other invalids wisely enough avoiding
our March winds; and here and there a mere vacationmaker, like myself.
Captain Bullock is sure to sail at the hour; and at the hour he is on
the paddle-box, the fasts are loosed, the warp run out, the crew pull in
on the warp on the port quarter, and the head swings off. No word is
spoken, but all is done by signs; or, if a word is necessary, a low
clear tone carries it to the listener. There is no tearing and rending
escape of steam, deafening and distracting all, and giving a kind of
terror to a peaceful scene; but our ship swings off, gathers way, and
enters upon her voyage, in a quiet like that of a bank or counting-room,
almost under a spell of silence.
The state-rooms of the "Cahawba," like those of most American sea-going
steamers, are built so high above the water that the windows may be open
in all but the worst of weather, and good ventilation be ensured. I have
a very nice fellow for my room-mate, in the berth under me; but, in a
state-room, no room-mate is better than the best; so I change my
quarters to a state-room further forward, nearer "the eyes of her,"
which the passengers generally shun, and get one to myself, free from
the rattle of the steering gear, while the delightful rise and fall of
the bows, and leisurely weather roll and lee roll, cradle and nurse one
to sleep.
The routine of the ship, as regards passengers, is this: a cup of
coffee, if you desire it, when you turn out; breakfast at eight, lunch
at twelve, dinner at three, tea at seven, and lights put out at ten.
Throughout the day, sailing down the outer edge of the Gulf Stream, we
see vessels of all forms and sizes, coming in sight and passing away, as
in a dioramic show. There is a heavy cotton droger from the Gulf, of
1200 tons burden, under a cloud of sail, pressing on to the northern
seas of New England or Old England. Here comes a saucy little Baltimore
brig, close-hauled and leaning over to it; and there, half down in the
horizon, is a pile of white canvas, which the experienced eyes of my two
friends, the passenger shipmasters, pronounce to be a bark, outward
bound. Every passenger says to every other, how beautiful! how
exquisite! That pale thin girl who is going to Cuba for her health, her
brother travelling with her, sits on the settee, propped by a pillow,
and tries to smile and to think she feels stronger in this air. She says
she shall stay in Cuba until she gets well!
After dinner, Capt. Bullock tells us that we shall soon see the high
lands of Cuba, off Matanzas, the first and highest being the Pan of
Matanzas. It is clear over head, but a mist lies along the southern
horizon, in the latter part of the day. The sharpest eyes detect the
land, about 4 P.M., and soon it is visible to all. It is an undulating
country on the coast, with high hills and mountains in the interior, and
has a rich and fertile look. That height is the Pan, though we see no
special resemblance, in its outline, to a loaf of bread. We are still
sixty miles from Havana. We cannot reach it before dark, and no vessels
are allowed to pass the Morro after the signals are dropped at sunset.
We coast the northern shore of Cuba, from Matanzas westward. There is no
waste of sand and low flats, as in most of our southern states; but the
fertile, undulating land comes to the sea, and rises into high hills as
it recedes. "There is the Morro! and right ahead!" "Why, there is the
city too! Is the city on the sea? We thought it was on a harbor or bay."
There, indeed, is the Morro, a stately hill of tawny rock, rising
perpendicularly from the sea, and jutting into it, with walls and
parapets and towers on its top, and flags and signals flying, and the
tall lighthouse just in front of its outer wall. It is not very high,
yet commands the sea about it. And there is the city, on the sea-coast,
indeed--the houses running down to the coral edge of the ocean. Where is
the harbor, and where the shipping? Ah, there they are! We open an
entrance, narrow and deep, between the beetling Morro and the Punta; and
through the entrance, we see the spreading harbor and the innumerable
masts. But the darkness is gathering, the sunset gun has been fired, we
can just catch the dying notes of trumpets from the fortifications, and
the Morro Lighthouse throws its gleam over the still sea. The little
lights emerge and twinkle from the city. We are too late to enter the
port, and slowly and reluctantly the ship turns her head off to seaward.
The engine breathes heavily, and throws its one arm leisurely up and
down; we rise and fall on the moonlit sea; the stars are near to us, or
we are raised nearer to them; the Southern Cross is just above the
horizon; and all night long, two streams of light lie upon the water,
one of gold from the Morro, and one of silver from the moon. It is
enchantment. Who can regret our delay, or wish to exchange this scene
for the common, close anchorage of a harbor?
II.
HAVANA: First Glimpses (I)
We are to go in at sunrise, and few, if any, are the passengers that are
not on deck at the first glow of dawn. Before us lie the novel and
exciting objects of the night before. The Steep Morro, with its tall
sentinel lighthouse, and its towers and signal staffs and teeth of guns,
is coming out into clear daylight; the red and yellow striped flag of
Spain--blood and gold--floats over it. Point after point in the city
becomes visible; the blue and white and yellow houses, with their roofs
of dull red tiles, the quaint old Cathedral towers, and the almost
endless lines of fortifications. The masts of the immense shipping rise
over the headland, the signal for leave to enter is run up, and we steer
in under full head, the morning gun thundering from the Morro, the
trumpets braying and drums beating from all the fortifications, the
Morro, the Punta, the long Cabaña, the Casa Blanca and the city walls,
while the broad sun is fast rising over this magnificent spectacle.
What a world of shipping! The masts make a belt of dense forest along
the edge of the city, all the ships lying head in to the street, like
horses at their mangers; while the vessels at anchor nearly choke up the
passage ways to the deeper bays beyond. There are the red and yellow
stripes of decayed Spain; the blue, white and red--blood to the fingers'
end--of La Grande Nation; the Union crosses of the Royal Commonwealth;
the stars and stripes of the Great Republic, and a few flags of Holland
and Portugal, of the states of northern Italy, of Brazil, and of the
republics of the Spanish Main. We thread our slow and careful way among
these, pass under the broadside of a ship-of-the-line, and under the
stern of a screw frigate, both bearing the Spanish flag, and cast our
anchor in the Regla Bay, by the side of the steamer "Karnac," which
sailed from New York a few days before us.
Instantly we are besieged by boats, some loaded with oranges and
bananas, and others coming for passengers and their luggage, all with
awnings spread over their sterns, rowed by sallow, attenuated men, in
blue and white checks and straw hats, with here and there the familiar
lips and teeth, and vacant, easily-pleased face of the Negro. Among
these boats comes one, from the stern of which floats the red and yellow
flag with the crown in its field, and under whose awning reclines a man
in a full suit of white linen, with straw hat and red cockade and a
cigar. This is the Health Officer. Until he is satisfied, no one can
come on board, or leave the vessel. Capt. Bullock salutes, steps down
the ladder to the boat, hands his papers, reports all well--and we are
pronounced safe. Then comes another boat of similar style, another man
reclining under the awning with a cigar, who comes on board, is closeted
with the purser, compares the passenger list with the passports, and we
are declared fully passed, and general leave is given to land with our
luggage at the custom-house wharf.
Now comes the war of cries and gestures and grimaces among the boatmen,
in their struggle for passengers, increased manifold by the fact that
there is but little language in common between the parties to the
bargains, and by the boatmen being required to remain in their boats.
How thin these boatmen look! You cannot get it out of your mind that
they must all have had the yellow fever last summer, and are not yet
fully recovered. Not only their faces, but their hands and arms and legs
are thin, and their low-quartered slippers only half cover their thin
yellow feet.
In the hurry, I have to hunt after the passengers I am to take leave of
who go on to New Orleans:--Mr. and Mrs. Benchley, on their way to their
intended new home in western Texas, my two sea captains, and the little
son of my friend, who is the guest, on this voyage, of our common friend
the captain, and after all, I miss the hearty hand-shake of Bullock and
Rodgers. Seated under an awning, in the stern of a boat, with my trunk
and carpet-bag and an unseasonable bundle of Arctic overcoat and fur cap
in the bow, I am pulled by a man with an oar in each hand and a cigar in
mouth, to the custom-house pier. Here is a busy scene of trunks,
carpet-bags, and bundles; and up and down the pier marches a military
grandee of about the rank of a sergeant or sub-lieutenant, with a
preposterous strut, so out of keeping with the depressed military
character of his country, and not possible to be appreciated without
seeing it. If he would give that strut on the boards, in New York, he
would draw full houses nightly.
Our passports are kept, and we receive a license to remain and travel in
the island, good for three months only, for which a large fee is paid.
These officers of the customs are civil and reasonably rapid; and in a
short time my luggage is on a dray driven by a Negro, and I am in a
volante, managed by a Negro postilion, and am driving through the narrow
streets of this surprising city.
The streets are so narrow and the houses built so close upon them, that
they seem to be rather spaces between the walls of houses than highways
for travel. It appears impossible that two vehicles should pass abreast;
yet they do so. There are constant blockings of the way. In some places
awnings are stretched over the entire street, from house to house, and
we are riding under a long tent. What strange vehicles these volantes
are!--A pair of very long, limber shafts, at one end of which is a pair
of huge wheels, and the other end a horse with his tail braided and
brought forward and tied to the saddle, an open chaise body resting on
the shafts, about one third of the way from the axle to the horse; and
on the horse is a Negro, in large postilion boots, long spurs, and a
bright jacket. It is an easy vehicle to ride in; but it must be a sore
burden to the beast. Here and there we pass a private volante,
distinguished by rich silver mountings and postilions in livery. Some
have two horses, and with the silver and the livery and the long
dangling traces and a look of superfluity, have rather an air of high
life. In most, a gentleman is reclining, cigar in mouth; while in
others, is a great puff of blue or pink muslin or cambric, extending
over the sides to the shafts, topped off by a fan, with signs of a face
behind it. "Calle de los Oficios," "Calle del Obispo," "Calle de San
Ignacio," "Calle de Mercaderes," are on the little corner boards. Every
little shop and every big shop has its title; but nowhere does the name
of a keeper appear. Almost every shop advertises "por mayor y menor,"
wholesale and retail. What a Gil Blas-Don Quixote feeling the names of
"posada," "tienda," and "cantina" give you!
There are no women walking in the streets, except negresses. Those suits
of seersucker, with straw hats and red cockades, are soldiers. It is a
sensible dress for the climate. Every third man, perhaps more, and not a
few women, are smoking cigars or cigarritos. Here are things moving
along, looking like cocks of new mown grass, under way. But presently
you see the head of a horse or mule peering out from under the mass, and
a tail is visible at the other end, and feet are picking their slow way
over the stones. These are the carriers of green fodder, the fresh cut
stalks and blades of corn; and my chance companion in the carriage, a
fellow passenger by the "Cahawba," a Frenchman, who has been here
before, tells me that they supply all the horses and mules in the city
with their daily feed, as no hay is used. There are also mules, asses,
and horses with bananas, plantains, oranges and other fruits in panniers
reaching almost to the ground.
Here is the Plaza de Armas, with its garden of rich, fragrant flowers in
full bloom, in front of the Governor's Palace. At the corner is the
chapel erected over the spot where, under the auspices of Columbus, mass
was first celebrated on the island. We are driven past a gloomy convent,
past innumerable shops, past drinking places, billiard rooms, and the
thick, dead walls of houses, with large windows, grated like dungeons,
and large gates, showing glimpses of interior court-yards, sometimes
with trees and flowers. But horses and carriages and gentlemen and
ladies and slaves, all seem to use the same entrance. The windows come
to the ground, and, being flush with the street, and mostly without
glass, nothing but the grating prevents a passenger from walking into
the rooms. And there the ladies and children sit sewing, or lounging, or
playing. This is all very strange. There is evidently enough for me to
see in the ten or twelve days of my stay.
But there are no costumes among the men, no Spanish hats, or Spanish
cloaks, or bright jackets, or waistcoats, or open, slashed trousers,
that are so picturesque in other Spanish countries. The men wear black
dress coats, long pantaloons, black cravats, and many of them even
submit, in this hot sun, to black French hats. The tyranny of
systematic, scientific, capable, unpicturesque, unimaginative France,
evidently rules over the realm of man's dress. The houses, the vehicles,
the vegetation, the animals, are picturesque; to the eye of taste
"_Every prospect pleases, and only man is vile._"
We drove through the Puerta de Monserrate, a heavy gateway of the
prevailing yellow or tawny color, where soldiers are on guard, across
the moat, out upon the "Paseo de Isabel Segunda," and are now
"extramuros," without the walls. The Paseo is a grand avenue running
across the city from sea to bay, with two carriage-drives abreast, and
two malls for foot passengers, and all lined with trees in full foliage.
Here you catch a glimpse of the Morro, and there of the Presidio. This
is the Teatro de Tacón; and, in front of this line of tall houses, in
contrast with the almost uniform one-story buildings of the city, the
volante stops. This is Le Grand's hotel.
III.
HAVANA: First Glimpses (2)
To a person unaccustomed to the tropics or the south of Europe, I know
of nothing more discouraging than the arrival at the inn or hotel. It is
nobody's business to attend to you. The landlord is strangely
indifferent, and if there is a way to get a thing done, you have not
learned it, and there is no one to teach you. Le Grand is a Frenchman.
His house is a restaurant, with rooms for lodgers. The restaurant is
paramount. The lodging is secondary, and is left to servants. Monsieur
does not condescend to show a room, even to families; and the servants,
who are whites, but mere lads, have all the interior in their charge,
and there are no women employed about the chambers. Antonio, a swarthy
Spanish lad, in shirt sleeves, looking very much as if he never washed,
has my part of the house in charge, and shows me my room. It has but one
window, a door opening upon the veranda, and a brick floor, and is very
bare of furniture, and the furniture has long ceased to be strong. A
small stand barely holds up a basin and ewer which have not been washed
since Antonio was washed, and the bedstead, covered by a canvas sacking,
without mattress or bed, looks as if it would hardly bear the weight of
a man. It is plain there is a good deal to be learned here. Antonio is
communicative, on a suggestion of several days' stay and good pay.
Things which we cannot do without, we must go out of the house to find,
and those which we can do without, we must dispense with. This is odd,
and strange, but not uninteresting, and affords scope for contrivance
and the exercise of influence and other administrative powers. The Grand
Seigneur does not mean to be troubled with anything; so there are no
bells, and no office, and no clerks. He is the only source, and if he is
approached, he shrugs his shoulders and gives you to understand that
you have your chambers for your money and must look to the servants.
Antonio starts off on an expedition for a pitcher of water and a towel,
with a faint hope of two towels; for each demand involves an expedition
to remote parts of the house. Then Antonio has so many rooms dependent
on him, that every door is a Scylla, and every window a Charybdis, as he
passes. A shrill, female voice, from the next room but one, calls
"Antonio! Antonio!" and that starts the parrot in the court yard, who
cries "Antonio! Antonio!" for several minutes. A deep, bass voice
mutters "Antonio!" in a more confidential tone; and last of all, an
unmistakably Northern voice attempts it, but ends in something between
Antonio and Anthony. He is gone a good while, and has evidently had
several episodes to his journey. But he is a good-natured fellow, speaks
a little French, very little English, and seems anxious to do his best.
I see the faces of my New York fellow-passengers from the west gallery,
and we come together and throw our acquisitions of information into a
common stock, and help one another. Mr. Miller's servant, who has been
here before, says there are baths and other conveniences round the
corner of the street; and, sending our bundles of thin clothes there, we
take advantage of the baths, with comfort. To be sure, we must go
through a billiard-room, where the Creoles are playing at the tables,
and the cockroaches playing under them, and through a drinking-room, and
a bowling-alley; but the baths are built in the open yard, protected by
blinds, well ventilated, and well supplied with water and toilet
apparatus.
With the comfort of a bath, and clothed in linen, with straw hats, we
walk back to Le Grand's, and enter the restaurant, for breakfast--the
breakfast of the country, at 10 o'clock. Here is a scene so pretty as
quite to make up for the defects of the chambers. The restaurant with
cool marble floor, walls twenty-four feet high, open rafters painted
blue, great windows open to the floor and looking into the Paseo, and
the floor nearly on a level with the street, a light breeze fanning the
thin curtains, the little tables, for two or four, with clean, white
cloths, each with its pyramid of great red oranges and its fragrant
bouquet--the gentlemen in white pantaloons and jackets and white
stockings, and the ladies in fly-away muslins, and hair in the sweet
neglect of the morning toilet, taking their leisurely breakfasts of
fruit and claret, and omelette and Spanish mixed dishes, (ollas,) and
café noir. How airy and ethereal it seems! They are birds, not
substantial men and women. They eat ambrosia and drink nectar. It must
be that they fly, and live in nests, in the tamarind trees. Who can eat
a hot, greasy breakfast of cakes and gravied meats, and in a close room,
after this?
I can truly say that I ate, this morning, my first orange; for I had
never before eaten one newly gathered, which had ripened in the sun,
hanging on the tree. We call for the usual breakfast, leaving the
selection to the waiter; and he brings us fruits, claret, omelette, fish
fresh from the sea, rice excellently cooked, fried plantains, a mixed
dish of meat and vegetables (olla), and coffee. The fish, I do not
remember its name, is boiled, and has the colors of the rainbow, as it
lies on the plate. Havana is a good fishmarket; for it is as open to the
ocean as Nahant, or the beach at Newport; its streets running to the
blue sea, outside the harbor, so that a man may almost throw his line
from the curb-stone into the Gulf Stream.
After breakfast, I take a volante and ride into the town, to deliver my
letters. Three merchants whom I call upon have palaces for their
business. The entrances are wide, the staircases almost as stately as
that of Stafford House, the floors of marble, the panels of porcelain
tiles, the rails of iron, and the rooms over twenty feet high, with open
rafters, the doors and windows colossal, the furniture rich and heavy;
and there sits the merchant or banker, in white pantaloons and thin
shoes and loose white coat and narrow necktie, smoking a succession of
cigars, surrounded by tropical luxuries and tropical protections. In the
lower story of one of these buildings is an exposition of silks, cotton
and linens, in a room so large that it looked like a part of the Great
Exhibition in Hyde Park. At one of these counting-palaces, I met Mr.
Theodore Parker and Dr. S. G. Howe, of Boston, who preceded me, in the
"Karnac." Mr. Parker is here for his health, which has caused anxiety to
his friends lest his weakened frame should no longer support the strong
intellectual machinery, as before. He finds Havana too hot, and will
leave for Santa Cruz by the first opportunity. Dr. Howe likes the warm
weather. It is a comfort to see him--a benefactor of his race, and one
of the few heroes we have left to us, since Kane died.
The Bishop of Havana has been in delicate health, and is out of town, at
Jesús del Monte, and Miss M---- is not at home, and the Señoras F---- I
failed to see this morning; but I find a Boston young lady, whose
friends were desirous I should see her, and who was glad enough to meet
one so lately from her home. A clergyman to whom, also, I had letters,
is gone into the country, without much hope of improving his health.
Stepping into a little shop to buy a plan of Havana, my name is called,
and there is my hero's wife, the accomplished author and
conversationist, whom it is an exhilaration to meet anywhere, much more
in a land of strangers. Dr. and Mrs. Howe and Mr. Parker are at the
Cerro, a pretty and cool place in the suburbs, but are coming in to Mrs.
Almy's boarding-house, for the convenience of being in the city, and for
nearness to friends, and the comforts of something like American or
English housekeeping.
In the latter part of the afternoon, from three o'clock, our parties are
taking dinner at Le Grand's. The little tables are again full, with a
fair complement of ladies. The afternoon breeze is so strong that the
draught of air, though it is hot air, is to be avoided. The passers-by
almost put their faces into the room, and the women and children of the
poorer order look wistfully in upon the luxurious guests, the colored
glasses, the red wines, and the golden fruits. The Opera troupe is here,
both the singers and the ballet; and we have Gazzaniga, Lamoureux, Max
Maretzek and his sister, and others, in this house, and Adelaide
Phillips at the next door, and the benefit of a rehearsal, at nearly all
hours of the day, of operas that the Habaneros are to rave over at
night.
I yield to no one in my admiration of the Spanish as a spoken language,
whether in its rich, sonorous, musical, and lofty style, in the mouth of
a man who knows its uses, or in the soft, indolent, languid tones of a
woman, broken by an occasional birdlike trill--
"_With wanton heed, and giddy cunning,_
_The melting voice through mazes running_"--
but I do not like it as spoken by the common people of Cuba, in the
streets. Their voices and intonations are thin and eager, very rapid,
too much in the lips, and, withal, giving an impression of the
passionate and the childish combined; and it strikes me that the
tendency here is to enfeeble the language, and take from it the openness
of the vowels and the strength of the harder consonants. This is the
criticism of a few hours' observation, and may not be just; but I have
heard the same from persons who have been longer acquainted with it.
Among the well educated Cubans, the standard of Castilian is said to be
kept high, and there is a good deal of ambition to reach it.
After dinner, walked along the Paseo de Isabel Segunda, to see the
pleasure-driving, which begins at about five o'clock, and lasts until
dark. The most common carriage is the volante, but there are some
carriages in the English style, with servants in livery on the box. I
have taken a fancy for the strange-looking two-horse volante. The
postilion, the long, dangling traces, the superfluousness of a horse to
be ridden by the man that guides the other, and the prodigality of
silver, give the whole a look of style that eclipses, the neat
appropriate English equipage. The ladies ride in full dress,
décolletées, without hats. The servants on the carriages are not all
Negroes. Many of the drivers are white. The drives are along the Paseo
de Isabel, across the Campo del Marte, and then along the Paseo de
Tacón, a beautiful double avenue, lined with trees, which leads two or
three miles, in a straight line, into the country.
At 8 o'clock, drove to the Plaza de Armas, a square in front of the
governor's house, to hear the Retreta, at which a military band plays
for an hour, every evening. There is a clear moon above, and a blue
field of glittering stars; the air is pure and balmy; the band of fifty
or sixty instruments discourses most eloquent music under the shade of
palm trees and mangoes; the walks are filled with promenaders, and the
streets around the square lined with carriages, in which the ladies
recline, and receive the salutations and visits of the gentlemen. Very
few ladies walk in the square, and those probably are strangers. It is
against the etiquette for ladies to walk in public in Havana.
I walk leisurely home, in order to see Havana by night. The evening is
the busiest season for the shops. Much of the business of shopping is
done after gas lighting. Volantes and coaches are driving to and fro,
and stopping at the shop doors, and attendants take their goods to the
doors of the carriages. The watchmen stand at the corners of the
streets, each carrying a long pike and a lantern. Billiard-rooms and
cafés are filled, and all who can walk for pleasure will walk now. This
is also the principal time for paying visits.
There is one strange custom observed here in all the houses. In the
chief room, rows of chairs are placed, facing each other, three or four
or five in each line, and always running at right angles with the street
wall of the house. As you pass along the street, you look up this row of
chairs. In these, the family and the visitors take their seats, in
formal order. As the windows are open, deep, and large, with wide
gratings and no glass, one has the inspection of the interior
arrangement of all the front parlors of Havana, and can see what every
lady wears, and who is visiting her.
IV.
HAVANA: Prisoners and Priests
If mosquito nets were invented for the purpose of shutting mosquitoes in
with you, they answer their purpose very well. The beds have no
mattresses, and you lie on the hard sacking. This favors coolness and
neatness. I should fear a mattress, in the economy of our hotel, at
least. Where there is nothing but an iron frame, canvas stretched over
it, and sheets and a blanket, you may know what you are dealing with.
The clocks of the churches and castles strike the quarter hours, and at
each stroke the watchmen blow a kind of boatswain's whistle, and cry the
time and the state of the weather, which, from their name (serenos),
should be always pleasant.
I have been advised to close the shutters at night, whatever the heat,
as the change of air that often takes place before dawn is injurious;
and I notice that many of the bedrooms in the hotel are closed, both
doors and shutters, at night. This is too much for my endurance, and I
venture to leave the air to its course, not being in the draught. One is
also cautioned not to step with bare feet on the floor, for fear of the
nigua (or chigua), a very small insect, that is said to enter the skin
and build tiny nests, and lay little eggs that can only be seen by the
microscope, but are tormenting and sometimes dangerous. This may be
excessive caution, but it is so easy to observe, that it is not worth
while to test the question.
There are streaks of a clear dawn; it is nearly six o'clock, the cocks
are crowing, and the drums and trumpets sounding. We have been told of
sea-baths, cut in the rock, near the Punta, at the foot of our Paseo. I
walk down, under the trees, toward the Presidio. What is this clanking
sound? Can it be cavalry, marching on foot, their sabres rattling on
the pavement? No, it comes from that crowd of poor-looking creatures
that are forming in files in front of the Presidio. It is the
chain-gang! Poor wretches! I come nearer to them, and wait until they
are formed and numbered and marched off. Each man has an iron band
riveted round his ankle, and another round his waist, and the chain is
fastened, one end into each of these bands, and dangles between them,
clanking with every movement. This leaves the wearers free to use their
arms, and, indeed, their whole body, it being only a weight and a badge
and a note for discovery, from which they cannot rid themselves. It is
kept on them day and night, working, eating, or sleeping. In some cases,
two are chained together. They have passed their night in the Presidio
(the great prison and garrison), and are marshalled for their day's toil
in the public streets and on the public works, in the heat of the sun.
They look thoroughly wretched. Can any of these be political offenders?
It is said that Carlists, from Old Spain, worked in this gang. Sentence
to the chain-gang in summer, in the case of a foreigner, must be nearly
certain death.
Farther on, between the Presidio and the Punta, the soldiers are
drilling; and the drummers and trumpeters are practising on the rampart
of the city walls.
A little to the left, in the Calzada de San Lázaro, are the Baños de
Mar. These are boxes, each about twelve feet square and six or eight
feet deep, cut directly into the rock which here forms the sea-line,
with steps of rock, and each box having a couple of portholes through
which the waves of this tideless shore wash in and out. This arrangement
is necessary, as sharks are so abundant that bathing in the open sea is
dangerous. The pure rock, and the flow and reflow, make these
bathing-boxes very agreeable, and the water, which is that of the Gulf
Stream, is at a temperature of 72 degrees. The baths are roofed over,
and partially screened on the inside, but open for a view out, on the
side towards the sea; and as you bathe, you see the big ships floating
up the Gulf Stream, that great highway of the Equinoctial world. The
water stands at depths of from three to five feet in the baths; and they
are large enough for short swimming. The bottom is white with sand and
shells. These baths are made at the public expense, and are free. Some
are marked for women, some for men, and some "por la gente de color." A
little further down the Calzada, is another set of baths, and further
out in the suburbs, opposite the Beneficencia, are still others.
After bath, took two or three fresh oranges, and a cup of coffee,
without milk; for the little milk one uses with coffee must not be taken
with fruit here, even in winter.
To the Cathedral, at 8 o'clock, to hear mass. The Cathedral, in its
exterior, is a plain and quaint old structure, with a tower at each
angle of the front; but within, it is sumptuous. There is a floor of
variegated marble, obstructed by no seats or screens, tall pillars and
rich frescoed walls, and delicate masonry of various colored stone, the
prevailing tint being yellow, and a high altar of porphyry. There is a
look of the great days of Old Spain about it; and you think that knights
and nobles worshipped here and enriched it from their spoils and
conquests. Every new eye turns first to the place within the choir,
under that alto-relief, behind that short inscription, where, in the
wall of the chancel, rest the remains of Christopher Columbus. Borne
from Valladolid to Seville, from Seville to San Domingo, and from San
Domingo to Havana, they at last rest here, by the altar side, in the
emporium of the Spanish Islands. "What is man that thou art mindful of
him!" truly and humbly says the Psalmist; but what is man, indeed, if
his fellow men are not mindful of such a man as this! The creator of a
hemisphere! It is not often we feel that monuments are surely deserved,
in their degree and to the extent of their utterance. But when, in the
New World, on an island of that group which he gave to civilized man,
you stand before this simple monumental slab, and know that all of him
that man can gather up, lies behind it, so overpowering is the sense of
the greatness of his deeds, that you feel relieved that no attempt has
been made to measure it by any work of man's hands. The little there is,
is so inadequate, that you make no comparison. It is a mere
finger-point, the _hic jacet_, the _sic itur_.
The priests in the chancel are numerous, perhaps twenty or more. The
service is chanted with no aid of instruments, except once the
accompaniment of a small and rather disordered organ, and chanted in
very loud and often harsh and blatant tones, which reverberate from the
marble walls, with a tiresome monotony of cadence. There is a degree of
ceremony in the placing, replacing, and carrying to and fro of candles
and crucifixes, and swinging of censers, which the Roman service as
practised in the United States does not give. The priests seem duly
attentive and reverent in their manner, but I cannot say as much for the
boys, of whom there were three or four, gentlemen-like looking lads,
from the college, doing service as altar boys. One of these, who seemed
to have the lead, was strikingly careless and irreverent in his manner;
and when he went about the chancel, to incense all who were there, and
to give to each the small golden vessel to kiss, (containing, I suppose
a relic), he seemed as if he were counting his playmates out for a game,
and flinging the censer at them and snubbing their noses with the golden
vessel.
There were only about half a dozen persons at mass, beside those in the
chancel; and all but one of these were women, and of the women two were
Negroes. The women walk in, veiled, drop down on the bare pavement,
kneeling or sitting, as the service requires or permits. A Negro woman,
with devout and even distressed countenance, knelt at the altar rail,
and one pale-eyed priest, in cassock, who looked like an American or
Englishman, knelt close by a pillar. A file of visitors, American or
English women, with an escort of gentlemen, came in and sat on the only
benches, next the columns; and when the Host was elevated, and a priest
said to them, very civilly, in English, "Please to kneel down," they
neither knelt nor stood, nor went away, but kept their seats.
After service, the old sacristan, in blue woollen dress, showed all the
visitors the little chapel and the cloisters, and took us beyond the
altar to the mural tomb of Columbus, and though he was liberally paid,
haggled for two reals more.
In the rear of the Cathedral is the Seminario, or college for boys,
where also men are trained for the priesthood. There are cloisters and a
pleasant garden within them.
V.
HAVANA: Olla Podrida
Breakfast, and again the cool marble floor, white-robed tables, the
fruits and flowers, and curtains gently swaying, and women in morning
toilets. Besides the openness to view, these rooms are strangely open to
ingress. Lottery-ticket vendors go the rounds of the tables at every
meal, and so do the girls with tambourines for alms for the music in the
street. As there is no coin in Cuba less than the medio, 6-1/4 cents,
the musicians get a good deal or nothing. The absence of any smaller
coin must be an inconvenience to the poor, as they must often buy more
than they want, or go without. I find silver very scarce here. It is
difficult to get change for gold, and at public places notices are put
up that gold will not be received for small payments. I find the only
course is to go to one of the Cambios de Moneda, whose signs are
frequent in the streets, and get a half doubloon changed into reals and
pesetas, at four per cent discount, and fill my pockets with small
silver.
Spent the morning, from eleven o'clock to dinner-time, in my room,
writing and reading. It is too hot to be out with comfort. It is not
such a morning as one would spend at the St. Nicholas, or the Tremont,
or at Morley's or Meurice's. The rooms all open into the court-yard, and
the doors and windows, if open at all, are open to the view of all
passers-by. As there are no bells, every call is made from the veranda
rail, down into the court-yard, and repeated until the servant answers,
or the caller gives up in despair. Antonio has a compeer and rival in
Domingo, and the sharp voice of the woman in the next room but one, who
proves to be a subordinate of the opera troupe, is calling
out,"Do-meen-go! Do-meen-go!" and the rogue is in full sight from our
side, making significant faces, until she changes her tune to "Antonio!
Antonio! adónde está Domingo?" But as she speaks very little Spanish,
and Antonio very little French, it is not difficult for him to get up a
misapprehension, especially at the distance of two stories; and she is
obliged to subside for a while, and her place is supplied by the parrot.
She is usually unsuccessful, being either unreasonable, or bad pay. The
opera troupe are rehearsing in the second flight, with doors and windows
open. And throughout the hot middle day, we hear the singing, the piano,
the parrot, and the calls and parleys with the servants below. But we
can see the illimitable sea from the end of the piazza, blue as indigo;
and the strange city is lying under our eye, with its strange blue and
white and yellow houses, with their roofs of dull red tiles, its strange
tropical shade-trees, and its strange vehicles and motley population,
and the clangor of its bells, and the high-pitched cries of the vendors
in its streets.
Going down stairs at about eleven o'clock, I find a table set in the
front hall, at the foot of the great staircase, and there, in full view
of all who come or go, the landlord and his entire establishment, except
the slaves and coolies, are at breakfast. This is done every day. At the
café round the corner, the family with their white, hired servants,
breakfast and dine in the hall, through which all the customers of the
place must go to the baths, the billiard rooms, and the bowling-alleys.
Fancy the manager of the Astor or Revere, spreading a table for
breakfast and dinner in the great entry, between the office and the
front door, for himself and family and servants!
Yesterday and to-day I noticed in the streets and at work in houses, men
of an Indian complexion, with coarse black hair. I asked if they were
native Indians, or of mixed blood. No, they are the coolies! Their hair,
full grown, and the usual dress of the country which they wore, had not
suggested to me the Chinese; but the shape and expression of the eye
make it plain. These are the victims of the trade, of which we hear so
much. I am told there are 200,000 of them in Cuba, or, that so many have
been imported, and all within seven years. I have met them everywhere,
the newly-arrived, in Chinese costume, with shaved heads, but the
greater number in pantaloons and jackets and straw hats, with hair full
grown. Two of the cooks at our hotel are coolies. I must inform myself
on the subject of this strange development of the domination of capital
over labor. I am told there is a mart of coolies in the Cerro. This I
must see, if it is to be seen.
After dinner drove out to the Jesús del Monte, to deliver my letter of
introduction to the Bishop. The drive, by way of the Calzada de Jesús
del Monte, takes one through a wretched portion, I hope the most
wretched portion, of Havana, by long lines of one story wood and mud
hovels, hardly habitable even for Negroes, and interspersed with an
abundance of drinking shops. The horses, mules, asses, chickens,
children, and grown people use the same door; and the back yards
disclose heaps of rubbish. The looks of the men, the horses tied to the
door-posts, the mules with their panniers of fruits and leaves reaching
to the ground, all speak of Gil Blas, and of what we have read of humble
life in Spain. The little Negro children go stark naked, as innocent of
clothing as the puppies. But this is so all over the city. In the front
hall of Le Grand's, this morning, a lady, standing in a full dress of
spotless white, held by the hand a naked little Negro boy, of two or
three years old, nestling in black relief against the folds of her
dress.
Now we rise to the higher grounds of Jesús del Monte. The houses improve
in character. They are still of one story, but high and of stone, with
marble floors and tiled roofs, with court-yards of grass and trees, and
through the gratings of the wide, long, open windows, I see the decent
furniture, the double, formal row of chairs, prints on the walls, and
well-dressed women maneuvering their fans.
As a carriage with a pair of cream-colored horses passed, having two men
within, in the dress of ecclesiastics, my driver pulled up and said that
was the Bishop's carriage, and that he was going out for an evening
drive. Still, I must go on; and we drive to his house. As you go up the
hill, a glorious view lies upon the left. Havana, both city and suburbs,
the Morro with its batteries and lighthouse, the ridge of fortifications
called the Cabaña and Casa Blanca, the Castle of Atares, near at hand, a
perfect truncated cone, fortified at the top--the higher and most
distant Castle of Príncipe,
"_And, poured round all,_
_Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste_"--
No! Not so! Young Ocean, the Ocean of to-day! The blue, bright,
healthful, glittering, gladdening, inspiring Ocean! Have I ever seen a
city view so grand? The view of Quebec from the foot of the Montmorenci
Falls, may rival, but does not excel it. My preference is for this; for
nothing, not even the St. Lawrence, broad and affluent as it is, will
make up for the living sea, the boundless horizon, the dioramic vision
of gliding, distant sails, and the open arms and motherly bosom of the
harbor, "with handmaid lamp attending":--our Mother Earth, forgetting
never the perils of that gay and treacherous world of waters, its change
of moods, its "strumpet winds"--ready is she at all times, by day or by
night, to fold back to her bosom her returning sons, knowing that the
sea can give them no drink, no food, no path, no light, nor bear up
their foot for an instant, if they are sinking in its depths.
The regular episcopal residence is in town. This is only a house which
the Bishop occupies temporarily, for the sake of his health. It is a
modest house of one story, standing very high, with a commanding view of
city, harbor, sea, and suburbs. The floors are marble, and the roof is
of open rafters, painted blue, and above twenty feet in height; the
windows are as large as doors, and the doors as large as gates. The
mayordomo shows me the parlor, in which are portraits in oil of
distinguished scholars and missionaries and martyrs.
On my way back to the city, I direct the driver to avoid the
disagreeable road by which we came out, and we drive by a cross road,
and strike the Paseo de Tacón at its outer end, where is a fountain and
statue, and a public garden of the most exquisite flowers, shrubs, and
trees, and around them are standing, though it is nearly dark, files of
carriages waiting for the promenaders, who are enjoying a walk in the
garden. I am able to take the entire drive of the Paseo. It is straight,
very wide, with two carriageways and two footways, with rows of trees
between, and at three points has a statue and a fountain. One of these
statues, if I recollect aright, is of Tacón; one of a Queen of Spain;
and one is an allegorical figure. The Paseo is two or three miles in
length; reaching from the Campo de Marte, just outside the walls, to the
last statue and public garden, on gradually ascending ground, and lined
with beautiful villas, and rich gardens full of tropical trees and
plants. No city in America has such an avenue as the Paseo de Tacón.
This, like most of the glories of Havana, they tell you they owe to the
energy and genius of the man whose name it bears.--I must guard myself,
by the way, while here, against using the words America and American,
when I mean the United States and the people of our Republic; for this
is America also; and they here use the word America as including the
entire continent and islands, and distinguish between Spanish and
English America, the islands and the main.
The Cubans have a taste for prodigality in grandiloquent or pretty
names. Every shop, the most humble, has its name. They name the shops
after the sun and moon and stars; after gods and goddesses, demi-gods
and heroes; after fruits and flowers, gems and precious stones; after
favorite names of women, with pretty, fanciful additions; and after all
alluring qualities, all delights of the senses, and all pleasing
affections of the mind. The wards of jails and hospitals are each known
by some religious or patriotic designation; and twelve guns in the Morro
are named for the Apostles. Every town has the name of an apostle or
saint, or of some sacred subject. The full name of Havana, in honor of
Columbus, is San Cristóbal de la Habana; and that of Matanzas is San
Carlos Alcázar de Matanzas. It is strange that the island itself has
defied all the Spanish attempts to name it. It has been solemnly named
Juana, after the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella; then Ferdinandina,
after Ferdinand himself; then Santiago, and, lastly, Ave María; but it
has always fallen back upon the original Indian name of Cuba. And the
only compensation to the hyperbolical taste of the race is that they
decorate it, on state and ceremonious occasions, with the musical prefix
of "La siempre fidelísima Isla de Cuba."